From 8456e13a656ce08e1f38eb46d790e5d5b07bd235 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Nils Lehnen <30603423+iderex@users.noreply.github.com>
Date: Tue, 25 Aug 2026 08:36:26 +0200
Subject: [PATCH] Hold the licence-field claim to what the reading supports
 (#1)

Two sites landed with a sentence saying nothing on the platform side can be made
to state both licences. The reading behind it was one command, `.license.spdx_id`
returning a single value, and that command says something narrower: this field
holds one licence. What the platform can be made to say on some other surface was
never read, so the sentence asserted an absence over a population nobody had
looked at.

The failure this prevents is the one rule 1 is written against. A claim wider
than its evidence reads exactly like a measured one, and this pair sits in the
two documents a reader most trusts about licences, so it would have been quoted
onward rather than checked.

Both sites now state the property the command shows, `.license` is an object and
not a list, and say plainly that no claim is being made about other surfaces.
The reason the declaration is a file in the tree is restated as the positive one
it always was: the tree is where this repository answers a licence question.

Signed-off-by: Nils Lehnen <30603423+iderex@users.noreply.github.com>
---
 README.md              | 10 ++++++++--
 decisions/licensing.md | 13 +++++++++++--
 2 files changed, 19 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)

diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 856eca1..68bb989 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -221,8 +221,14 @@ one licence for a tree that grants under two:
     gh api repos/Flowfin/hub --jq '.license.spdx_id'
     AGPL-3.0
 
-Run 2026-08-25. Nothing on the platform side can be made to state both, which is
-why the declaration is a file in the tree.
+That field holds one licence and cannot hold two:
+
+    gh api repos/Flowfin/hub --jq '.license | type'
+    object
+
+Both run 2026-08-25. The declaration is a file in the tree because the tree is
+where this repository answers a licence question, and a reader who stops at that
+field will not have the whole answer.
 
 The plugin repositories this catalogue lists are separate repositories under
 their own terms. A catalogue listing something is not a statement about its
diff --git a/decisions/licensing.md b/decisions/licensing.md
index 50eacb8..9636ef7 100644
--- a/decisions/licensing.md
+++ b/decisions/licensing.md
@@ -121,8 +121,17 @@ what a single root `LICENSE` gets:
     gh api repos/Flowfin/hub --jq '.license.spdx_id'
     AGPL-3.0
 
-Run 2026-08-25. A reader who takes that field for the whole answer will miss this
-file, and nothing on the platform side can be made to state two.
+That field holds one licence and cannot hold two, which is a property of the
+field rather than a judgement about it:
+
+    gh api repos/Flowfin/hub --jq '.license | type'
+    object
+
+Both run 2026-08-25. So a reader who takes that field for the whole answer will
+miss this file. What the platform can be made to say elsewhere, in a description
+or a page of its own, is not read here and no claim is made about it: the reason
+this declaration is a file in the tree is that the tree is where a licence
+question is answered, not that no other surface exists.
 
 ## What refuses a departure